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Jean-Paul Sartre, still always wrong

Posted Saturday night, February 3, 2018.

Never been a fan of Sartre, probably because I can’t pronounce his name. But it’s why I find this funny:

In Alix de Saint-Andre’s novel Papa est au Pantheon, the government approaches the daughter of a dashing and dead writer named Berger---a thinly veiled caricature of Andre Malraux---whom the French president has to induct into the Pantheon. The motivation is, well, political. As the director of the Pantheon tells the daughter, few things are more economical than pantheonization. “We bring out the students, bring out the Republican Guard and bring out a new stamp: and all of this costs nothing.” The publicity for the government is free, automatic, and overwhelming. Still, there is a caveat: “You need a good client.” Some “engaged writers” are too Catholic (Charles Peguy and Francois Mauriac), others are too Communist (Louis Aragon and Paul Eluard); one was not enough of resistance fighter (Andre Gide), while another was too much of a flake (Marcel Proust). And Sartre? Forget it, laughs the director: he is “still always wrong.”